Let’s face it: We live in a technology-driven world, and digital marketing has in many ways surpassed traditional channels. With consumers now turning to the internet for every question they have, it’s easy to understand why thoughtful digital marketing can make or break a business. Without it, any company is as good as dead in the water.

This necessitates not only the implementation of savvy tactics, but a knowledge of what pitfalls to avoid ahead of time. Here's how to avoid the kinds of digital marketing mistakes that can derail your brand faster than a mouse click.

You’ll Never Reach Your Goals You Don't Set

This might seem obvious, but it’s amazing how many brands out there look at digital marketing as something to just dip their toes into. Setting up a bunch of social media accounts and throwing a few hashtags out there with the hopes they’ll catch fire won’t provide much benefit if there’s not a clearly defined goal behind it.

Maybe that goal is increased traffic to the brand’s website or generating more potential leads through mobile. Whatever the case may be, measurable goals will help to establish a common connection with your audience and drive all future strategy.

Understand Your Audience's Needs

It goes without saying that your customers are the lifeblood of your business, so failing to understand what they want will make any digital marketing efforts pointless. Even the most well-thought out and catchy campaign will fall flat if it doesn’t resonate with the intended consumer, or worse, misses the target audience altogether. Everything from use of language in content to assessing how the hypothetical customer uses digital media should factor into your brand’s marketing approach. Take the time to dig into your audience analysis and find out what motivates them.

Churn Out Content With a Purpose

Internet users are constantly eating up content, but the content that gets shared and earns rankings love from Google has a real identity. Search-engine algorithms are constantly evolving, and it’s imperative that content be distinctive if it’s going to benefit a brand’s digital marketing efforts. Well-crafted content should say something that touches on your goals and offers something valuable to your intended audience.

Staying on top of trends and the competition is equally vital. Ask yourself, “Is now the right time to use this tactic to connect with my audience?” The answer may not always be yes. Keeping all this in mind as you craft content will result in more lead conversions, rather than it falling flat.

Track the ROI of Your Marketing Efforts

What your digital marketing ROI looks like is going to be different from other brands. What all businesses have in common, though, is the need to track their efforts to maximize yield. Refining your SEO approach and using utilizing an AdWords strategy similar to PPC Pro may translate to actual leads, but understanding the data is key to maintaining that success.

What you don’t want to do is apply a “set it and forget it” approach to your digital campaigns. This doesn’t mean that everything must be checked and monitored every hour of the day, but regular observation and maintenance is necessary. There’s no shortage of analytics tools out their to help, so don’t be scared to try different ones and determine what helps your business accrue maximum ROI.

More from Entrepreneur

Terry's digital marketing expertise can help you with campaign planning, execution and optimization and best practices for content marketing.

Starting, buying, or growing your small business shouldn’t be hard. Guidant Financial works to make financing easy for current and aspiring small business owners by providing custom funding solutions, financing education, and more.